Gundam has always been about war, what causes it, and human evolution. But it has also been about model kits. In Model Suit Gunpla Builders Beginning G, war is completely ignored and the models become the focus; celebrating thirty years worth of plastic kit building.

The story starts when Haru Irei goes to see the Odaiba Gundam with his father. When he decides he wants to build a model kit, he fails to pick up the last RX-78 and instead stumbles upon a rare model kit; the Beginning Gundam. Upon completing it, he starts to play in the Gunpla Battle video game where his model is scanned into a computer so he can actually pilot it against other model kits. In one of these battles he meets the mysterious Boris Schauer, who shows him how deep the world of Gunpla can get.

The series is a three episode OVA of episodes consisting of fifteen minutes each. It can either be seen as a crass marketing ploy that cuts out the War Is Hell middleman or a cute little show about the culture that has kept Gundam going for thirty years - which seeing as its meant to celebrate the models - not the series, the latter would the optimal mindset to enjoy it. Either way you can view it online here. It also spawn two sidestory mangas, Gunpla Builders Beginning D and Gunpla Builders Beginning J.

Char Clone: Boris Schauer. One may argue that he might just be a cosplaying Char fanboy, but he still serves a similar role, being Stealth Mentor, and later The Rival to Haru. Oh, and he gets around riding a Cool Horse, just like Char.

The Cameo: A few lesser known suits pop up in this namely the Astray Red Frame which only has a few seconds of screen time before it's carved up by The O.

Elsewhere Fic: The manga series Gunpla Builders D and Gunpla Builders J tell stories of other kids who get Beginning Gundam, Shingo Asume and Takeru Nekki.

Expy/Homage ...it'd be easier to list anything that isn't one or the other considering the celebratory nature of this mini-series, between the names, the Char Clone, and the very gundam models themselves...

Epic Fail: One of the reasons why Koji Matsumoto's Hi-ν Gundam loses to the Beginning Gundam is because clumsiness on the part of Koji's assistant caused the Hi-ν's left hip polycap to break in the middle of the battle. The fact that the Hi-ν was already stuck in a tarp didn't help either.

He Was Quite a Looker: In Gunpla Builders D, when Shingo found an old photo of the Mishima siblings, he has no idea who they are (only Daiyu plays this trope, young Saki simply wasn't dyeing her hair nor wearing the costume yet).

Lethal Joke Character: Bearguy is so maladjusted and ridiculously pimped that her opponent don't expect it to pack decent weaponry at all.

Mix And Match Gunpla: Super Custom Zaku F2000 was a Zaku Type F2 with extra armor and armed with equipments from other Zaku II kits. Many more are appear in D and J.

Mundane Made Awesome: Inversion. Kenta's white Sazabi is just a Palette Swap, but if you also build Gunpla and ever tried to paint the red Sazabi into Kenta's white, then you know it's truly amazing paintjob.

Palette Swap: Kenta's White Hyaku Shiki and Sazabi and Kouji's Nu-Colored Hi-Nu Gundam are custom colored versions of the said 3 mobile suits. The sidestories add many more of them.

There's also plenty of palette-swaps shown during the Gunpla Championship Fights, such as the black-painted The O, and the red and blue Z'Gok.

Shout-Out: The last scenario in Episode 2, where Boris is creating an upgrade kit for Haru's Beginner, is a direct Shout-Out to Char's intentional leakage of Psycho Frame to Amuro and his Nu Gundam in Char's Counterattack.

Super Prototype: Downplayed. Since Gunpla are commercial modeling kits, most of them are mass produced. Still, limited kits such as the Beginning Gundam are more powerful in Gunpla Battles than generic kits.

Ace Custom: Ranges from subtle changes as seen in the Hi-Nu Gundam (it's actually built using parts from three separate kits, since each kit only has a pair of fully functional fin funnels), to extreme makeovers as seen in the Forever Gundam, the Super Custom Zaku F2000 and, of course, the Bearguy.

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